Fabulous Festival Feet!

Festival season is upon us at last - WOOHOO! With so many good gigs on in Ireland this summer to cater for everyone's music taste I thought I'd share an extremely simple tip that can brighten up any festival outfit. Let's face it, we still want to look unreal (even if we are covered in sweat and booze). 

First things first, for fabulous festival feet you will need to have your toenails painted a nice vibrant colour. Perhaps even paint each toenail a different colour, or do some nail art. Whatever your nail polish preference just make sure it's nice and colourful. You'll also need to grab some fab sandles (mine are from Penneys -€6).

Now here's the simple secret - to add a splash of colour and fun, take a trip to your nearest dress making shop (Hickey's or The Woollen Mills are perfect) and buy a few euro worth of coloured ribbon. You could  go for candy shades, patterned ribbon or bold colours like me. Wrap the ribbon around your ankle and cut excess ribbon accordingly.Tie the ribbon around your ankle in a tight bow. You can make the bow as big or as small as you like. You could have more than one ribbon around your ankle if you want to exaggerate the look.

Laura x

A Surprising Eye Primer!

 Given that us Ruby Fab girls are such party animals, we really need our make up to last as long as possible  so we don't look like complete ROTSERS at the end of a night out. Sometimes we just don't have the dosh to splash out on expensive eye primers, so whilst experimenting one day I found that my old reliable lip product doubled up as an unbelievable eye primer - voilà! 

The Body Shop's Coconut Lip Butter, doesn't only make your lips FAB it also smells divine. It is a moist product, so when using this as an eye primer only barely run your finger on its surface to apply on the eye lid. 

Once you have a very thin layer of the lip butter on your eyes simply apply your eye shadow of choice. Not only does your eye shadow stay on longer, but the colour appears more intense and there is an added  shimmer - hooray! If you are going to experiment with lip product as eye primer I would advise avoiding lip gloss (too sticky) and Vaseline (too oily). Stick with water or butter based moisturising lip product. This is by far the best product I have tried though. 

Not bad for a product that costs around €5 and makes both your eyes and lips fabulous!

<3 Laura

Love for Lush

Today I took a little trip after work to the nasally stimulating shop that is Lush on Grafton Street. I was on the search for a little treat after a heavy weekend of partying and I wanted something sweet and lovely, I was tempted by the giant bars of soap but none of them were sweet enough for me. (this coming from a girl that works all day with cupcakes, how can I not have reached my sugar fill?!). A really wonderfully helpful girl was right to my aid showing me the sweetest shower gels available, this one, called "It's Raining Men" its made of 80% Honey. I couldn't wait to get home and have a good scrub, and my God I cannot recommend this enough! Firstly the fact that Lush products are not tested on animals is a major win for me, this made my shower guilt free, there are no rotten chemicals in the products so I used it all over, including my face. 5 hours later, my skin is still moisturized and smelling of honey. For anyone that's looking for a shower gel with a long lasting girly scent I recommend this ten fold. For just under €10 it's worth it, believe me. 

Fingers crossed with this new honey skin of mine it really will start raining men ;)

Jess : ) x

Valuable Vogue

Myself and Jess at the Ruby Fabulous factory love Vogue as much as the next fashionista, but let's face it - it's seldom (never!) we can afford the clothes that are showcased in this world-renowned glossy. That's why we LOVE their supplement - More Dash than Cash. This supplement comes with all of the glamour and 'oohs and aahs' as the original Vogue without the outrageous price tag on the clothes it displays.

HnM, River Island, Miss Selfridge, and ASOS are amongst some of our fave brands on show in the May edition. They do stand beside some of the 'high end high street brands' like Reiss, Karen Millen and French Connection. The thing I love most about this supplement is that it compacts the season's key designer looks in a comprehensive guide and highlights where on the high street you can embrace these trends for less!

The May edition of More Dash than Cash looks at Burberry's Tribal Tech trend, Phillip Lim's Candy Colours, Prada's Retro Americana and Louise Vuitton's Decorative Day looks. It's the perfect shopping companion for any handbag! It gives any shopper the right inspiration and round-up of the latest trends whether you are spending your money in Topshop, HnM, Penneys or even in the second hand or vintage shops.

Also we <3 the cover model from the May edition; Nyasha Matonhodze. She is FAB.

Strike a pose and Vogue!

High Impact Lashes from the High Street!

We girls LOVE to flutter our eye lashes and these days it's all about the false effect. Sometimes we just don't have the time to be applying lash strips yet we still want an impressive flutter. I found a Topshop voucher from Christmas that I was sure I lost (score!) so I decided to spend some of it on mascara as I was only surviving on dredges. 

Topshop are stocking a new cosmetics brand - Sisters of the New Moon - and the packaging is so pretty, so I was drawn in immediately. I picked up the dreamy pastel mascara box; Lash Catcher (in black), and proceeded to the check out. 

The wand is sturdy and the brush is smaller than brushes on mascaras that I have used recently. I found it was easy to control your application and reach corners without worrying about marking around the lash area. I loved the pigment, and after one coat you immediately have a nice curl and increased volume. The mascara has an extremely smooth texture, leaving no clumps. It spreads very easily so you really don't have to use a lot. The product is not perfumed and it's scent is quite natural.

At €15 this high street mascara isn't necessarily "cheap" but it's worth a purchase on pay day or when you have a voucher like me! It beats high-end mascaras that I have used in the past. 

Happy fluttering <3

Quality Quiff

Ok so I've been embracing the quiff quite a bit recently and people have been asking how I do it, so here goes.

The best time to do a quiff is when your hair is a bit greasy and easier to handle. When your hair is only washed it can be a bit fine and fly-away so it is harder to manage.

You will need:

One head of not-so-fresh hair

Strong hair spray

A tail comb

Bobbins

Clips

Step 1 - pull forward the front section of your hair using your tail comb. The bigger the quiff you want, the more hair you should take down. Take the rest of your hair up into a pony tail. To avoid the front section being taken into the pony tail tie a separate bobbin around it or use a clip.

Step 2 - back comb the front section of your hair until you look like a crazy person! Back comb the hair underneath rather than the hair that's facing outwards.

Step 3 - twist the end of your front section into a point.

Step 4 - take the point of your front section and pull it back and position it.

Step 5 - pin your section in place, spray it and smooth it over with your hands.

Step 6 - back comb your pony tail (as you can see I am a fan of the back combing).

Step 7 - twist your pony up into a messy bun. You can use a doughnut to crate a neater look.

And VOILÀ!

Fab hair in five minutes.

DIY: Fabulous Floral Headband

You know Spring is here once you see the floral prints creeping back into shops, and my God they are back! With both high fashion and high street brands all embracing the typical Springtime print, there is no way to avoid it. SO LOVE IT! It's fun, colourful and pretty. You don't have to go mental and wear a full floral gown, why not try jeans, a cute t shirt and a floral headband? Floral headbands have been massive recently, no doubt due to the influence of Lana Del Rey, but who are we to complain? they are gorgeous!

They are available in loads of places in town from a range of prices, but to go for the big full on fabulous floral headband at a low price your going to have to do some DIY!

What you'll need is:

Individual bunches of plastic flowers. €1.50

These can be bought from all of the Pound shops on Talbot Street

Get 3/4 bunches of all your fave colours:

A strong pair of scissors:

A headband with a plait in it, this one is from Penneys for €1:

Choose from each bunch your favourite flowers, you'll need about 10 for this:

Cut the stem of the flower, all of these stems will have wire in them, so the best way is to give them a little cut and bend the stem until it snaps, leave enough stem for attaching the flower to the headband:

(all of my cut flowers:)

Line the flowers up in the order you'd like them to be on your head:

Slide the stem through the plait of the headband:

Bend over the stem once:

And continue to fold the stem over until there is no wire stem protruding:

Continue to do this until you're happy with your arrangement and the amount of flowers on the headband:

AND THAT'S IT :)

Lana Del Rey eat your heart out!! Affordable, seasonal and completely fabulous!

Jess : ) x